O n Newstalk, Tom Dunne reports how it's the worst day's news headlines he can ever recall and I'm in the car listening to the litany of disaster stories on my way to meet a Flood. Fortunately, it's Paddy Flood. It's also Thanksgiving and we both reflect mercifully on our relative good fortune as a warm-up for horse-talk.

Flood's particular good fortune came as recently as last Sunday when a trip to the UK yielded a high-profile, high-octane BBC-televised Becher Chase win aboard Vic Venturi, which now -- almost by rite of passage -- has been handed the yellow jersey in the Grand National betting. The 23-year-old's description of the experience is as candid as it is succinct.

"It's as good a buzz as you'd get off any drug or any drink," he says. He delivers it with the conviction of one not simply dabbling in daft invention.

The jockey's Grand National Fences' CV to this point is made up of two mixed attempts. He got a great spin around and completed in the great race on his first try on Baily Breeze, finishing eighth in 2008.

In April this year, he was determined to go one better on Himalayan Trail. Got there early. Walked the course, which he hadn't done the previous year. Ran the race in his head. Over and over. "I was over-anxious," Flood recalls. "Not nervous, just wound up. And the horse was totally wound up."

By the time of the fourth false start, Himalayan Trail was like a bullet from a gun to the first fence -- with the inevitable consequence. In seconds it was over, and Paddy Flood, together with fellow weigh-room confidant Barry Geraghty, was taking the earliest bath.

So third time lucky around, he dispensed with the 'Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail' maxim by simply visiting the two smallest fences on the course at Aintree beforehand and vouching to take the race as he found it. Ironically, it was Geraghty who Flood had phoned for advice on how to ride the race, only to receive a plaintive assurance: "Just enjoy yourself". Which is just what Flood did.

An insight into jockeyship is opened by the contrast. "It's all about rhythm," he says. "Rhythm and confidence. When you get into a rhythm you start believing that you can't fall. You start half showing off to yourself and the horse. It's when you're indecisive that you confuse the horse."

So it is that Flood was in flow last Sunday, as opposed to overflow back in April.

It seems increasingly that technology is poking its fibre-optics into racing's cosseted tradition -- with Sea The Stars having his own Facebook page as one example. Well, Paddy Flood wasn't best pleased by a message posted on his Facebook page after Sunday insisting Vic Venturi didn't jump well enough to win a National. "So I wrote back a message this long (widens hands) . . ." It's a long way from when jockeys couldn't write their own names.

Paddy Flood has had to wrestle with his demons during his short saddle career -- describing himself then as "a mixed-up boy in a man's world" -- and there was a time when his self-esteem was rock-bottom. So for him confidence and motivation are key. The day before Vic Venturi at Aintree, he was at Ascot to ride Schindler's Hunt in the Grade Two Amlin Chase. Pleased and all as he was with the run (without winning), he pauses to describe the scene as the jockeys were getting legged-up in the parade ring.

"The Betfair Chase was on the Big Screen and everyone was glued to it. AP McCoy was in front of me and we were turned around watching the race even walking in the opposite direction. It was some finish." Then he segues to how he nearly mowed down Imperial Commander in the Ryanair last March. To Schindler's Hunt the jockey adds the names of Rare Bob, In Compliance, Ninetieth Minute and today's Hatton's Grace ride Hardy Eustace as "reasons to get out of bed in the morning" after what he describes sniffily as a "slow summer". "It's hard to motivate yourself with bad horses on hard ground."

Which is precisely what we don't have at Fairyhouse's shop-window fixture this afternoon, the feature of which is the Hatton's Grace. Flood teams up with hardy perennial Hardy Eustace, which has been around since the time of the Ark, yet at 12 seems at home to be retaining all his old vim. "His work is good, but then it always is. He's like a two-year-old at home, you'd never know he was 12. You certainly couldn't retire him the way he is at the moment."

It must be remembered also that Hardy was being written off this time last year yet emerged to dent a couple of reputations when coming again to win the Morgiana at Punchestown, one of two Grade Ones on Flood's CV from last year's campaign. Loyalty is a much-cherished value for Flood, and sticking with Dessie Hughes' standard-bearer means he cannot maintain his partnership with Ninetieth Minute on whom he recorded a famous Coral Cup win in March. It is obvious he is torn.

"He blew up at the second last at Navan (in the Lismullen). His hurdling has improved and he is physically and mentally a better horse this year and remember he did beat Solwhit at Thurles last year although that was a funny race."

Punchestown Grade One winner Rare Bob will probably not be seen until after Christmas but In Compliance could well emerge again next weekend for the John Durkan and Flood is effervescent over the rekindled nine-year-old. "He has a huge cruising speed and I couldn't hold him the last day at Thurles where they couldn't go fast enough for him."

Asked about the injuries that have plagued the fragile gelding's career to date, Flood is politely dismissive: "I couldn't pick out his ailments working him at home."

Paddy Flood prizes this time of year surrounded by good horses with everything to look forward to. But, asked about future ambitions, he is conditioned not to look too far ahead. "I'd like to match my Grade Ones from last season (two) and beyond that I just want to keep enjoying it."

Very fitting then for this Thanksgiving. Moreover, he could have accomplished both at Fairyhouse by later this afternoon.

Sunday Independent